I have to slog across a ridge and furrow field to avoid
a herd of cattle. By a water trough near the stile, a mummy cow shields her two
calves and stares me down, head slightly lowered. I’m always holding my breath
in these situations. There was another report in the press this week of an
elderly lady (admittedly twenty years senior to me, and in company of a dog
which may have been misbehaving) who was trampled to death by some Belted
Galloways, a breed about whose temperament you can read differing opinions. But whatever, maternal instinct under
perceived threat is something of which to be wary in all animals, human or
otherwise.
I breast the slight rise on the track down towards
Fotheringhay castle, and climb the mound of its robbed-out keep by a path steep
enough to make my ankles complain. You know the story. Sir Anthony Babington
wrote Mary Stuart a note trying to enlist her support for an assassination attempt
on Elizabeth, with the aim of restoring an English Catholic monarchy. Mary
stopped short of endorsing murder, but lent her weight to regime change.
Babington was executed, and Mary exiled to the castle at Fotheringhay.
Subsequently Elizabeth maintained that she was tricked into signing Mary’s
death warrant. Whatever the truth of that, Mary was beheaded in the castle on
the 8th February 1587, a poignant, tragic story, all the more awful
for the mess the executioner made of his job.
Of course these events have been fertile ground for romanticised
historical films and novels, and it’s been amusing to see ill-researched
versions (usually originating in the US) which sketch mountains as a backdrop
for the final scenes in Mary’s life. Nay,
mi duck, there’s not a hill worth speaking about in a hundred and fifty miles.
Even Sandy Denny, who wrote a song for Fairport
Convention about Mary’s last days, and then subsequently named her own band
after the village, refers to ‘lonely’ Fotheringhay in her lyric, and I don’t
think that’s right either. It’s true Mary was held here because the place was
easy to defend. Sight lines for the defenders were excellent, and there was
marshland for would-be attackers to negotiate. But Peterborough was only eight
miles distant (Mary’s body was initially interred there, before her son James
had it moved to Westminster Abbey), communications along the Nene were good,
and there were numerous villages of much the same size as Fotheringhay up and
down the valley. Cock ups and conspiracies. Nothing new under the sun.
Incidentally, the tomb James had constructed for Mary
faces Elizabeth’s in Westminster, and he made sure it was bigger than the
Virgin Queen’s. I also note with a smile that the dedication of the handsome
church in Fotheringhay is to St. Mary and
All Saints. That’s Mary the mother of Jesus of course, and a common enough
name, but who worshipping here in any subsequent age wouldn’t spare a thought
for Mary Stuart as they walk up the church path or take communion? The exterior
of the church is a wondrously beautiful landmark. For once the interior doesn’t
perhaps match it for all the pleasure to be taken in clear windows, lofty
ceilings and the charmingly painted pulpit and organ. There’s a reason for that
of course. What we experience now is only half the original building, and the
ugliness of the wall behind the altar betrays the church’s brutal shortening
when the adjoining college for priests was dissolved during the Reformation.
Fotheringhay was a Yorkist seat. Richard III was born
here. Today a wedding party is making preparations for their Big Day tomorrow
after the contemporary style; lots of flowers, and those odd bits of wispy
white nylon people like to stick on the ends of the pews to make the church look…weddingy.
There’s no space for cars in the car park of the next door Falcon pub, because it’s occupied by a marquee, and a lighting truck
has just turned up so the guests can mum & dad-dance their way to the
midnight hour. The lass behind the bar serves me a GB. Did I want food? she asks. I tell her not today, and she breathes a
sigh of relief. The ovens have gone down, but it’s not a problem, there’s only
one set of covers: they’ll have to have salad. And stuff. What kind of
ancillary ‘stuff’ I wonder, but keep
my thoughts to myself. Tomorrow’s groom and best man bestride the bars like
mighty colossi, owning the joint for a day. It’s a slightly strange vibe.
Up the road I yomp across scrunched up earth between
the farmer’s thoughtfully placed little white sticks and fetch up at
Woodnewton’s sewage plant. This straggly village improves from then on, and has
its rep greatly polished when at cosy St. Mary’s church I learn that Nicolai
Poliakoff aka Coco the Clown spent his last years here. He had an extraordinary
life. I lift two pieces of delight from the Wikipedia article about him to
improve your day. Firstly he ‘had two
distinctive visual features that endeared him to television audiences: his
boots, described as being size 58, and his trick hair with hinges in the
central parting which allowed it to lift when he was surprised…’ . Secondly
in April 1957 he ‘was knocked over and
injured by a vehicle driven by Kam, “the only motoring elephant in the world”’ I
think I probably saw him live in a performance by Mills Circus at about the
same time, along with boxing kangaroos and all kinds of other acts which
wouldn’t now be allowed. Clowning however, goes on forever, and has something
to say about bullying, being bullied, and the inappropriateness or not of
revenge.
Opposite the church is a lane leading down to Conegar
Farm where there’s a delightful mill setting, the clear water sliding through strands
of weed as straight and beautiful as a pomp rock guitarist’s hair. From there
the track to Southwick (pronounced Suth-ick) climbs gently at the edge of
fields, then drops to a stream, then resumes uphill progress through lovely
Howe Wood before emerging into the open just above the village. As I sit on a
bench and survey the scene a young lab trots out from behind me, followed by
his mistress, who lets me know that she’s about to collect the bag of dog poo
she left in the field below. Too much info, but a gold star for responsible
dog-owning behaviour. There’s yet
another St. Mary’s, on the left where the track meets the road on the village
fringe. Inside a narrow space, the sanctuary floor is polished and shining,
entirely covered by the slabs that mark the Lynn family tombs. Above the altar
is emblazoned the legend ‘Till he come’.
If this is Southwick,
then where is the northern village to which its name obliquely refers? Perhaps
Apethorpe, perhaps King’s Cliffe, both yet to be visited. Iron smelting was an
industry here in the 10th century, and perhaps before that too.
By now I’ve remembered that many years ago I walked
this circle from Fotheringhay on a chilly winter’s morning, and somehow missed
my way before Perio Mill. The path seems clear enough today but where it dives
through a hedge in making a right turn I find a roughly ploughed path-less field,
and have to take an uncomfortable diversion around its knobbly perimeter,
saying rude things about the farmer as I go. To be fair, I don’t know what
he/she’s supposed to do when ploughing’s done. I’m just not sure it’s my job to
do the equivalent of wading through eighteen inches of snow to keep the right
of way open.
The benefit of autumn on an immaculate cloudless day
such as this is the golden low light simultaneously warming the buildings of
Fotheringhay’s single street, and sharpening their profiles. How many of them
are built with stones from the old castle?
And in this week of renewed climate change protest
from the world’s schoolchildren, what part of our past will the future most
resemble? Nothing new under the sun.
'The evening
hour is fading within the dwindling sun
And in a
moment those embers will be gone
And the last
of all the young birds flown
Tomorrow at
this hour she will be far away
Much farther
than these islands
Or the lonely
Fotheringhay'
(Sandy Denny)
Clicks on the
churchwarden’s counter: 19.5 km. 6 hrs. 21 deg. C. Four stiles. Twenty one gates. Sixteen bridges, one way or another. Kites, squirrels,
butterflies, a dormouse frightened by my tread. Three churches, again, all
open! The devotion to St. Mary very strong in these parts. The ground dry, dry,
dry.
Lord
When I’m
desperate
To drive
through my own ideas
Help me to
listen
To the unreasonable
voices of others.
When I am
sure I am right
Remind me of
the times
I have been
so wrong.
When instinct
tells me
What is best
for me
Help me to do
What will
bless everyone.
Amen.
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